


Once Upon a Dream

by in_way_too_deep



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: M/M, Song fic, prompt, song is once upon a dream from sleeping beauty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-03-31
Packaged: 2019-12-29 02:11:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18298157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/in_way_too_deep/pseuds/in_way_too_deep
Summary: "songfic prompt that no one asked for? for any combination of Ronan/Adam/Kavinsky I guess: " I know you - I walked with you once upon a dream; I know you - the gleam in your eye is so familiar a gleam; and I know it's true that visions are seldom all they seem; but if I know you, I know what you'll do - you'll love me at once, the way you did once upon a dream.""





	Once Upon a Dream

It was the strangest and saddest thing Kavinsky had ever seen. Ronan had brought the scholarship boy to his substance party. The dusty interloper didn’t fit in like Ronan did but, then again, no one had ever fit in at his parties quite like Ronan Lynch did. That didn’t stop Ronan from staring at Adam like he held the answers to all the questions of the universe.

The worst part – the unforgiveable part – was that Kavinsky was beginning to agree. He’d never interacted with Adam beyond the occasional exchanging of glares, but recently, he’d become a common sight in Kavinsky’s dreams. Whether it was Ronan’s obsession rubbing off on Kavinsky or something else entirely, Kavinsky couldn’t tell. The thought of Adam Parrish being significant alongside Ronan was one thing, the idea that he could be important independently was terrifying.

But, whenever Kavinsky feared something, he embraced it. He would rather be a reckless fool than a coward, so he walked towards where Ronan and Adam were sitting. With a knowing look on his face, Kavinsky sidled up to the pair and let his words fall smoothly from his lips. “Look what the cat dragged in. Dick’s second favorite pet.” Adam’s response, a blunt “Kavinsky”, didn’t disappoint. Kavinsky could have predicted that exact response. In fact, he had before, in his dreams. 

He was filled with a sense of perverse pride; being able to forge someone he didn’t know was more than skill, it was pure magic. Maybe Parrish was simply easily understood, nothing more than trailer trash, but it didn’t feel that way. The feeling of pride soon gave way to an unnerving feeling. He’d only met dream-Adam but Kavinsky felt like he  _knew_  real Adam Parrish.

_I know you - I walked with you once upon a dream_

Ronan was immediately perturbed by Kavinsky’s expression. More accurately, he was disturbed that it was directed at Adam. Kavinsky frequently leered at him but now he went almost unnoticed. The intense coil of anger Ronan felt at this simple exchange was probably unwarranted. And he couldn’t react in anger without giving away more than he was willing.  

A disproportionate reaction on Ronan’s end would result in, at best, Ronan looking possessive of Adam and, at worst, possessive of Kavinsky. Neither of them were necessarily false but Ronan didn’t want to parse out the web of emotions that had formed seeing Kavinsky and Adam interact.

He never agreed to have feelings for either of them; having feelings for the both of them was unimaginable. Apparently, Kavinsky was reaching the same conclusion. Where before Ronan saw his lecherous grin, akin to the look a predator gives its prey, he now saw what could only be described as fear.

Ronan had never seen the look on his face before but he recognized it nonetheless. He must have been wearing the same expression. It was an expression borne from the overwhelming, crushing, realization that the potential, beautiful, tangible future from your dreams was never going to be realized. Sometimes, Ronan thought, it was worse to wake up from a good dream than a nightmare.

_I know you - the gleam in your eye is so familiar a gleam_

Adam was equally wary of the look in Kavinsky’s eyes but for a different reason. He may have been a magician, but he couldn’t walk among dreams the way Ronan and Kavinsky did. The complex expressions that flited over both Ronan and Kavinsky’s faces spoke more of their shared dreaming than anything else had so far. Usually, Adam had no desire to be a dreamer, but he didn’t much enjoy being left out.

He may not have known Kavinsky, but he was beginning to know Ronan and they were more alike than they’d admit. Or maybe they’d admit it freely; Adam wasn’t fluent in their language just yet. Even so, he could tell that they were exchanging charged messages, and for some inexplicable reason, they included Adam. He should have been disgusted by the very idea of Kavinsky’s attention, and on some level, he was.

All he knew about Kavinsky came from Ronan’s rare and undecipherable comments and Gansey’s, more frequent, disparaging remarks. Gansey had once said Kavinsky was unredeemable, worthless. He rarely said anything as outwardly condemning, so Adam took it to heart, but not in the way Gansey had intended. Before those comments Adam had a view of Gansey as having a saintly level of forgiveness and acceptance. It was one of the things Adam had appreciated the most about his friend.

Unfortunately, afterwards Adam knew that Gansey’s judgement-free appearance was, at least somewhat superficial. This made Adam even more paranoid that he was constantly being judged and found wanting. Ironically, Gansey’s comments pushed Adam to reserving judgement on Kavinsky. The small amount of discomfort he felt at the idea of Kavinsky was wiped away by incredibly-human look Adam imagined he saw pass over Kavinsky’s face.  

_and I know it's true that visions are seldom all they seem;_

There was nothing Kavinsky liked more than being one step ahead, and nothing he liked less than being caught off guard. He would have expected that having learned about Adam Parrish in his dreams would have left him powerful, but instead he was filled with an unwelcome sense of vulnerability. Kavinsky may not have had complete control over his dreams, but he prided himself in always being able to distinguish between dream and reality. His impromptu meeting with Adam and Ronan was challenging that.

Originally, Kavinsky had been pleased at how accurately he had predicted Parrish’s behavior, but now he was overwhelmed. He was a lot of things, but he wasn’t psychic. That left two possibilities. Either he had dreamed Adam or Ronan had. The first was impossible and the second extremely unlikely. The silence that had descended on the trio served as a reinforcement of Kavinsky’s unease. He was faltering, and it was showing.

He was about to say something, anything, to regain balance but stopped short. He was struck by a third possibility. Kavinsky was a firm believer in nothing. It wasn’t that he lacked belief, rather that he believed there was no point. He didn’t believe in a cosmic purpose or karmic retribution. Furthermore, he believed that those who believed in those things were naïve idiots, unaware of the absence of justice. That made the third possibility, not impossible, but irreconcilable with his world.

There was no way that his least unpleasant dreams were premonitions of a possible reality. In his dreams involving Adam and Ronan, shameful as they were, he was happy. They were happy together. And in no lifetime – in no imaginable universe – did Joseph Kavinsky get a happily ever after. Fairytales were for children.    

_but if I know you, I know what you'll do - you'll love me at once,_

Kavinsky’s uncharacteristic silence was not lost on Ronan. Had Kavinsky been wearing his trademark sunglasses, Ronan would not have been able to piece together the reason behind the silence. As it was, Kavinsky had chucked them into a burning car earlier in the evening in a show of dramatics. That meant that Ronan saw the confusion and calculation that colored Kavinsky’s face as he stood in silence.

It was probably unwise to jump to conclusions, but Ronan valued his intuition. He’d recently been having dreams about Kavinsky and Adam. Separately, they were nothing to write home about. However, they increasingly been about KavinskyAndAdam. Unusually non-abstract visions of unnervingly mundane interactions. The look on Kavinsky’s face made Ronan think they’d been sharing in the dreams.

That, in and of itself, was unusual. Maybe when they attempted, in person, they could manage a vague dream-based collaboration. They hadn’t attempted it, but he felt on a baser level that it was possible. While he knew it was possible, he’d never imagined that it would have occurred unintentionally. Especially with dreams as soft as the ones he’d been having lately. He knew Kavinsky, and the Kavinsky he knew had no softness to him.

But there wasn’t another explanation for the strange dreams and Kavinsky’s even stranger reaction to seeing Adam. All of it was nonplussing, leaving Ronan bereft of words. The most surprising reaction of all, however, was Adam’s. There was absolutely no way Adam had shared in their dreaming, yet he didn’t seem as put off by Kavinsky’s presence as Ronan would have predicted. Instead he looked defensive and closed-off but, more than anything, interested. He hadn’t written Kavinsky off. It was almost like he was unconsciously mirroring dream-Adam and their dream-meetings.        

_the way you did once upon a dream_

Adam had never been more daring and idiotic than when he’d been with Ronan. He’d also never been more free. It may have been that same, infectious, idiocy but he felt that Kavinsky was a similar force. There was a magnetism about him. Simultaneously repulsing and drawing Adam in. It was stupid; Kavinsky had done absolutely nothing to convince Adam that he was anything more than the rumors. But, then again, he’d never done anything to Adam that validated the rumors either. And Adam knew that the halls of Aglionby held many rumors about him as well; all untrue.

It wasn’t easy, sparing judgement of the likes of Joseph Kavinsky, but Adam tried. An unfortunate side effect of this was that Kavinsky’s magnetism became less repulsive. Adam stood in the fragile silence and wished that Kavinsky would say something. He knew that if he opened his mouth he’d be able to walk away. Kavinsky’s insults would inevitably break whatever spell had been cast over Adam. However, Kavinsky was a contradictory creature; he never did what people wanted or expected him to do.

Instead of speaking he turned on his heels and headed back to the center of the party. He resumed his usual revelries and virtually ignored Adam and Ronan for the remainder of the night. Adam looked at Ronan, an equally contradictory being, and saw him looking at Kavinsky. Ronan’s unease shouldn’t have comforted Adam, but it did. It felt nice, knowing that Ronan and Kavinsky were equally unbalanced by what should have been an exceedingly forgettable interaction.

Had they been less affected, Adam could have convinced himself that he’d imagined everything. He could have moved on, forgotten Kavinsky altogether. But now he was stuck. He stood by the BMW, exchanging stolen glances with Ronan and Kavinsky. Standing in a twilight-zone esq present, envisioning an even less understandable future, Adam Parrish felt more and less knowable than ever.        

**Author's Note:**

> As always, thanks for reading and please let me know if there's anything you want to see in a future fic!


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